Damien has over a decade of professional writing experience under his belt, as well as a repulsively hairy belly. Rumours that he turned down a role in The Hobbit to work on Nintendo Life are, to the best of our knowledge, completely and utterly unfounded.

I was more hyped about this than Smash Bros. so rather disappointed about the delay though it may just be that it's coming out in America the Friday before Christmas Day. I just really hope now (even more than before) that GCN games come to VC straight after the Gamecube adapter's launch.

What the heck? Are they serious? If it means a better game I'm all for it...but this means less new games to boost sales this holiday season. At least we still got Bayonetta, Smash and Hyrule Warriors...(though I wouldn't be surprised if they delayed Smash in europe due to amiibo issues or something)

I wont lie, I'm well and truly steamed about this. The only games i'll be buying for Wii U this year now are Hyrule Warriors & Bayonetta 2. Useless bunch of people. Excuse my language but I'm not impressed one bit

This is a bad move, the game would sell more in just before Christmas period as gifts for kids I mean look at it any parent would look at it and feel it is a safe choice for the little ones they needed that kind of game in the lineup.

Say whaaaat!! Bit gutted about this tbh, I get the impression they are trying to flesh out the content of this to justify a retail release. It's a very poor showing from Nintendo regardless since they had momentum to build on after e3 and delays and set backs are nobody's favourite headlines!! What will Nintendo actually have released in 2014? I'll be surprised if ssb makes it out in time and everything else is second/third-party. Of course mk8 is amazing but we all knew that would sell.....What I don't see is any plans to use the popularity to shift console's with more releases soon afterwards!!

@Ichiban@Pahvisame here...first Shovel Knight and now this :/Guess I'll be getting Smash early after all (actually didn't want to get it until we see an Ike figurine, whenever this'll happen - IF it happens)

Ah, that sucks. This is the game I was looking forward to the most over the Christmas period as I'm not a huge Smash fan (I know, I know...) I suppose there's still Bayonetta 2 and Hyrule Warriors though.

What?? I guess they have their reasons (whatever they are) but this kinda makes me not want to buy the game and will definitely impact on the overall sales of the game in Europe a bit. I will still buy it though, but I really hate these kinds of release date gaps :/

I'm just confused as to why this is being released at retail at all. It feels to me that this game belongs on the eShop. Does anyone else feel the same way? My logic being that you essentially do the same thing over and over

Here's something Nintendo could try with digital releases of it's games at least...

If a game is going to be delayed in one territory for whatever reason then it should offer consumers the OPTION* to purchase the game from a different region, kinda like buying an import title, with the caveat that at a later time they will be able to "upgrade" to their own language version when it is ready.

This means everyone gets the Option to access the game at the same time as everyone else and if you want your specific language version and it isn't quite ready yet then you simply buy the game now and wait till that 'patch' or 'update' is ready for it.

That's something I would think about trying if I ran Nintendo anyway.

*You could click a button that says you understand and accept that the version you are buying is in accordance with the laws of a different territory and that you are ok with that and are willing to use this version and follow the rules and region specific laws assigned to this version until your region specific version becomes available or whatever.

disagree with a lot of the comments. the game is only delayed in europe most likely because of classification issues. if they were "stretching it out to justify the price" it would be delayed worldwidePlease stop with the insults — TBD

@agqwestern agreed, like my earlier post said, I think this was planned as an e shop game but is being fleshed out to fill MASSIVE EMPTY SPACES in the release schedule. Its cringe worthy , Nintendo's track record of getting games to shelves on time and when needed most. We all want better games but nobody wants such a barren period without games either!

2015 is already packed full of games though... Looks like I'm only getting Hyrule Warriors this year. It's going to be a difficult time keeping this game spoiler free once it hits the US, it would've been nice to play this during the holiday season.

Too bad, I'm actually pretty hyped for this. So all the games I'm looking forward to (except Bayonetta) are pushed to next year - Xenoblade Chronicles X, Devil's Third, Zelda and Captain Toad? Looks like a bad second half of the year now after all.

@GuyWithTheGames the delay will most likely be due to Europe having way more languages to translate for then as you said, classification. However Nintendo have more experience of this system than any other company on earth. The reason this is being delayed is because it wasn't finished/submitted with enough time to clear for the date provided by themselves. They failed to meet their own deadline.....

@King47 All this whining over nothing is truly stupid agreed. @ULTRA-64 Oh wow I didn't know you worked for Nintendo and had insider info like that. Tell me what's Smash U's release date please? @Kolzig No it really shouldn't. Not for a game like this. Maybe Smash if a country gets it an entire month before us*Glaring at Japan*, but this hell no. @Kosmo I know right. I'm still waiting on my copy of Pokemon Art Academy and Pokémon Trading Card game that's been delayed forever of wait wrong country. @GuyWithTheGames There really is. Now they can know what's it's like for America lately even though this hardly counts. @outburst You need a review before buying it? Why bit just keep up with the development?

@Kirk
Coincidentally, I was thinking of the same idea yesterday when someone mentioned about Shovel Knight taking forever to be released. And then I read an IGN article this morning about the tweet by Paramount Pictures in Australia of TMNT movie release on September 11 with a picture of the turtles jumping off a burning building. They later took down and apologize for the picture because of the outrage on the connection of the 9/11 terrorist attack.

It dawned on me that it's not that simple to just release the NA version of Shovel Knight or Captain Toad on another region like EU/AU etc. The job of those who localized the games is to make sure it will be acceptable on their target regions in terms of language and content without offending anyone in a large scale.

Also, the promotional costs of a game will be higher if they promote it now and promote again later when they've finally localized it. Not to mention they will have to deal on customers wanting a refund because they've purchased a game they couldn't understand even though they've been warned that it will be localized later.

@ModestFan93
Not really a big fan of Sonic except in the Sega Megadrive days. Plus they have been releasing bad to mediocre Sonic games lately. I'm not just gonna buy Sonic Boom without researching first. For most Nintendo games however, I know they are well made (they run smoothly well, no game-breaking bugs, etc) plus I love the captain toad levels on SM3DW.

Crikey my Wii U has hardly had any retail games released that I'm that bothered about since launch in 2012 and this was on my radar for day one to change that. Looks like the barron spell will continue for me unfortunately into 2015...

After being a Nintendo gamer since the NES, I have to say this is by far the worst couple of years for Nintendo releases I remember (excluding 3DS), even the N64 faired more consistent first party releases...

This sucks for you European folks. Hopefully this doesn't happen with Smash Bros. The Wii U NEEDS a good game this holiday season. I understand if they need to delay Smash to make it as good as possible- no one wants a crappy or unfinished Smash Bros., but if they push it (and Captain Toad) back, there's really nothing coming out from September to 2015. Bayonetta is nice, but it's not the big name game most people will buy a Wii U for.

Nintendo needs to wise up and start padding their game droughts with more VC games. It would be less painful to wait for their bigger releases if I could play N64 games, like they promised I'd be able to LAST January, way back in 2013.

The point isn't who gets what first, it's that there shouldn't be any need for it to be an issue at all. Nintendo should be releasing simultaneously and/or getting rid of region locking. This isn't an RPG or a strategy game, there's no need for localisation to be an issue. Long-term European Nintendo fans remember too many of these delays and instantly feel queasy.

@electrolite77 I agree. I can understand if there are rating issues and such, but they should be aware of those things already. I can't see the localization of this game being the most difficult. So it makes no sense to have separate releases, aside from Japan. I liked the Pokemon XY release.

We have black Friday here in America, so that is probably why it wasn't delayed for us.

I wouldn't be surprised if it's delayed in NA as well. This can't be because of translation work can it? Aren't NA games released with multiple languages besides English? I want this game, but there are soooo many games scheduled for this year that I don't mind if it's delayed a couple months. Are there release dates for Mario Maker and Splatoon yet?

Why is Europe being left out all of a sudden? What does this mean for other upcoming Nintendo games like Smash, Bayo and Hyrule Warriors!?? This is very poor practice Nintendo, and coming right after you got so much good-will

@RainbowGazelleNintendo IS focusing on making proper new games. They take a huge amount of time and effort. This is a way to turn a great mini-game into a full release that many people will enjoy (even if you don't). I don't see a problem here at all. If you are saying that you'd rather Nintendo only make games you like I can understand the desire but it's completely unreasonable. For instance, if I demanded the same, I'd be pressing for this game to be made, not put on the shelf. :/

Sucks that it's delayed, but lets be honest, as much as I like how this game is turning out, it was meant as a stop gap for the Holiday season because there are so few third party games. It's a smaller, less expensive game mostly because it is trying to hit a percise target date. This is a bummer.

Wow. Serious drought for the next 6 months. Not a huge fan of smash, hyrule warriors is apparently struggling to even be a consistent 30fps according to projared. Captain Toad is definitely the one I wanted. I wouldn't doubt it if they end up delaying it in the us and japan yet too.

I said they would pull a Tropical Freeze on Captain Toad weeks ago, and people flamed me for it. Looks like I got the last laugh. I fully expect it to be a January 2015 release in North America as well. Luckily for Nintendo, the XB1 and PS4 don't have the best lineup for the rest of this year either.

"Think about it they probably don't want it to compete with Smash Bros which makes sense kinda."

I highly doubt that's the reason since it's still set to come out in North America and Japan around the holidays. It's more than likely a snag they hit with publishing in Europe, or something to that effect. Not to mention, smash bros and captain toad are very different games, going after very different audiences. Those two games won't compete against each other.